WordPress Themes

I may have to get a new one.
I have this simple little blog I write to keep friends and family up to date - Almontage.
If you use WordPress software to write a blog you can have Wordpress host it or you can get your own domain and install the WordPress software there. The first way you have no choice in how your blog looks - Wordpress supplies the theme. In the second case, you can choose a vanilla WordPress theme or install one more to your liking. That is how I handled it and I was happy. The theme I chose is very minimalist - just one column of text - but does what I need.
Now I see the maker of my theme has stopped selling it. That means no more support - but hopefully it'll continue to work with WordPress software updates. They are about to change the whole interface for controlling the blog so we'll see.
I don't mind getting a new theme if I can find one of similar characteristics. I don't need anything complicated as I'm not advertising a product or running a Web store. These themes are not expensive but I need one with long-term support.

Yes, I agree that using wordpress.com is a great solution for personal blogs.
Unfortunately, I started off using Blogger and had some problems with ID and passwords. I ended up with 2 different blogs and never was able to combine them. At that point, I wanted to get my own domain mainly to host and link images to 3rd party sites as needed. When I did that, I was able to set up the "free" wordpress.org software and choose my own theme and plugins. But if I were starting a blog today for personal use I would no doubt go with wordpress.com.

Yeah, for my own personal website, I use my domain (vtel57.com), but forward it to https://vtel57.wordpress.com/. Easy-peasy. Something to consider, Ray, if you decide to go the wordpress.com route some day. However, there are definite advantages to having your own server space for sure.

Yes, it gets expensive to host photos on sites like Photobucket if you want to link to here. I can get unlimited storage and linking from my own site. But I have to worry about spam and security so that is one advantage wordpress.com gives. If I had started with wordpress.com instead of Blogger I would probably still be there. I also like my theme - there were only about 200 of it sold so you don't see it every day,

I'm aware of other sites but I'll never trust them again after getting burned so badly with Photobucket. They can change their terms of service in a heartbeat. I'm really not sure if the Imgur TOS permits 3rd party link and embed even if it works. Much happier having control on my own domain.

PhotoBucket was a giant clusterscrew. Their servers slowed down to a creep. Their methods for downloading your stored images back onto your own computer failed miserably. Their customer support became non-existent. They basically held peoples' photos hostage for payment. I gave up on those rat bisterds a long while back. Fortunately for me, I always kept copies of my images on my own system, so I didn't lose anything. The aggravation was... well, aggravating.

I had a previous experience with an image server (ImageShack) that must have been the source of PhotoBucket's current business plan. Unfortunately, you can't fully trust any online service. Some are better than others, but all have the potential to fail sometime. This is also the primary reason you will NEVER see me using Cloud services. I want MY STUFF ON MY SYSTEMS!

Well for sure I keep all my photos stored locally and backed up locally. However there are times you want to post a photo on your blog or link it here so that is what I use my own domain for. I had to redo all my blog posts when Photobucket screwed me so I was not willing to try another online site. I suppose I could have uploaded all my stuff to Imgur. They seem to be more reasonable but I don't want to take the chance.
Really to get the cloud capacity for a huge photo collection you'll need to pay. Free only gets you so far. Even with Photobucket I did pay a little for storage, but they wanted $$$ to have third party site linking.
To be fair to Photobucket they did provide a way to download all my linked photos with no issues.

I have now completed the migration of all my blog images (back to 2002) to my own site.
I also note that Photobucket has abandoned its extortionist policies and is again displaying 3rd party embedded photos with a watermark on them instead of breaking all the graphics on the Internet. They have some new plans which are quite affordable for my needs as well. But they lost me as a customer a long time ago and I don't trust them anymore.